When war was declared in 1812, Louisiana had no long-term allegiance to the United States, but the British increasingly interfered with trade, and goods quickly accumulated at the city’s docks, generating profits for no one. Louisiana’s governor, William Charles Cole Claiborne, had been dispatched from Washington—first appointed to the post by President Jefferson and then elected after statehood—but the city’s powerful Creoles, as white New Orleanians of Spanish or French heritage were called, had little respect for him.
